I look at the jellies both nibbling the petals. The mother and the daughter.
“Yours alone to catch. You’ll find it very easy,” the Statue says. But there is a note of uncertainty in her chime voice. “You’ll find they want to be with you.”
“You’ll find they swim right in,” the other says. And then they both smile at me. I am devastated by the effect. Undone in my blood. Whatever they ask of me, I will do. To the ends of the earth. I lean closer to the open throat of the tank. A hush behind me at the table. Seth’s waiting silence like a roar. I lower my net into the Depths. I wait for them to swim into it like magic. But my Roses, my jellies, do not swim in. They stay exactly where they are, nibbling the petals. A cough behind me. A tapping of gloved fingernails upon the massacred table of petals and blood. I move the net closer to my jellies. And as I do, they drift farther away to the opposite side of the tank. The daughter one is very close to the mother one now. The Statues clear their throats. I hear one of them sigh. It is a distinctly human impatience. Not at all celestial.
“Come on, now, this is silly,” I say. I move the net closer again. This time, something happens. The little jelly moves even closer to the big jelly, as if seeking protection. And the big jelly embraces the little one with its tentacles, seems to hold it so close. Then in one swoop, it takes it into itself. Absorbs it so there is no more little one, no more daughter. Only the mother now.
A gasp behind me at the table. Seth’s silence is thunder. And then a growling voice: “Get. The. Other. Now.”
“Catch your Rose, Daughter,” sings a Statue beside me. “And become your Most Magnificent Self.”
“Fulfill your Destiny,” sings the other.
The mother jelly looks at me with its strange fish eyes. It’s trying to say something. What?
“Catch your jelly, Daughter,” the Statues sing at the same time now. Tugging my wrist where the bracelet tingles and the eye watches, as if to say, Careful, careful. I am here. I am with you.
The Statue’s touch no longer feels like the perfect touch. It feels terribly cold. I hear a knife in each chime voice, pointed at my throat. I look at the mother jelly pulsing in the blue-green pool, looking up at me; her daughter’s inside her jelly body somewhere. I remember Lake screaming. Red tentacles hanging from mouths at the table. Black silk hands ripping at the still-wriggling flesh.
“No,” I say before I can think.
“What?”
“Help me,” I whisper to the moonbright ones along the wall, all still looking at their silver trays like mirrors. Only one looks up. Old, pale eyes. Beautiful dark sin that looks far too Lifted, very Bright. She looks at me with the net in my hand. Shakes her head. “Selected,” she hisses. When I’m so not worthy, her face says. She should have been Selected. As for helping me, well, I shouldn’t need help now.
The veiled ones watch all of this, impatient. The Queen of Snow smiles nervously. “Theater,” she says to them. “Just a bit of dinner theater for you to enjoy between courses.” She looks at me. “What is this about, Daughter? You have been Selected. Do you not wish to reach your Apotheosis? To take the last crucial step on your Beauty Journey? To become your Most Magnificent Self?” There are still blood flecks on her very white face from Lake’s jelly. I think of Lake. Screaming in her white-and-red silk. Her stomach looking slashed open. Used.
“No,” I say. And then all the moonbright ones look up from their mirror trays. All the veiled ones at the table gasp. “What did she say?”
I look at the veiled ones, staring at me very silently. “No, merci. I’d prefer to… not.”
The Queen of Snow’s smile grows cold. “You’d prefer… to not?” She takes a step toward me and I feel myself take a step back. My red shoes feel awake now on my feet.
“I see,” she says. She takes another step toward me. Again, my shoes take me a step back. I’ll go with you, I tell them in my mind.
“Yes,” I say to the Queen of Snow, backing away. “So sorry. Desolate. Désolée, I mean.”
“Well. We are also désolée. Très désolée to hear that you are dissatisfied with your Beauty Journey. Particularly when you are so close to the End.”
I nod like this is indeed a sham. Shame. “So if you’ll just give me my purse, I’ll pay you for your very wonderful severings thus far. And then I’ll be on my way.”
The veiled ones laugh now, uneasily. Ha. Theater, is this? Well, all right. We were not expecting to be entertained as well as fed. How charmant. Though the entertainment is a bit… willful? Obstinate for our taste. Pas à notre go?t. Speaking of taste, can we… eat?